The Bosque Boys

Monica Crowley compares Hillary Rodham Clinton to Glenn Close's character at the end of Fatal Attraction:

"You think she's dead and then she sits bolt-upright in the bathtub!"

Though he is little known in the West, Coptic priest Zakaria Botros — named Islam’s “Public Enemy #1” by the Arabic newspaper, al-Insan al-Jadid — has been making waves in the Islamic world. Along with fellow missionaries — mostly Muslim converts — he appears frequently on the Arabic channel al-Hayat (i.e., “Life TV”). There, he addresses controversial topics of theological significance — free from the censorship imposed by Islamic authorities or self-imposed through fear of the zealous mobs who fulminated against the infamous cartoons of Mohammed. Botros’s excurses on little-known but embarrassing aspects of Islamic law and tradition have become a thorn in the side of Islamic leaders throughout the Middle East.

Botros is an unusual figure onscreen: robed, with a huge cross around his neck, he sits with both the Koran and the Bible in easy reach. Egypt’s Copts — members of one of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East — have in many respects come to personify the demeaning Islamic institution of “dhimmitude” (which demands submissiveness from non-Muslims, in accordance with Koran 9:29). But the fiery Botros does not submit, and minces no words. He has famously made of Islam “ten demands,” whose radical nature he uses to highlight Islam’s own radical demands on non-Muslims.

From National Review.

Unnoticed by major media, one of the most important stories of the millenium is happening in the Islamic world. More Muslims are converting to Christianity today than at any time in history. As I've said before, unless the current jihad succeeds, Islam is doomed as a vibrant world religion. It will weaken before the attractions of Western hedonistic materialism, and before the power of Christian missions.

See also here, and here,

D-Day: War's over, man. Wormer dropped the big one.
Bluto: Over? Did you say "over"? Nothing is over until we decide it's over! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!
Otter: Germans?
Boon: Forget it, he's on a roll.
Bluto: And it ain't over now. 'Cause when the goin' gets tough...
[thinks hard]
Bluto: the tough get goin'! Who's with me? Let's go!
[runs out, alone; then returns]
Bluto: What the [expletive deleted] happened to the Delta I used to know? Where's the spirit? Where's the guts, huh? "Ooh, we're afraid to go with you Bluto, we might get in trouble." Well just kiss my [expletive deleted] from now on! Not me! I'm not gonna take this. Wormer, he's a dead man! Marmalard, dead! Niedermeyer...
Otter: Dead! Bluto's right. Psychotic, but absolutely right. We gotta take these [expletive deleted]. Now we could do it with conventional weapons that could take years and cost millions of lives. No, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part.
Bluto: We're just the guys to do it.
D-Day: Let's do it.
Bluto: LET'S DO IT!

I continue to be flabbergasted by the parade of effete column-writers and faint-hearted Democratic Party hand-wringers who suggest that Mrs. Clinton should quit.

Did these guys never have a high school football coach?

Quitters never win and winners never quit.

There is time on the clock, and she's got the ball. Granted, she needs to march the length of the field and three points won't win it--but so what. Fourth quarter, man! This is why you come out for two-a-days in the heat of August. Gut-check time.

Seriously, what kind of a message would a Hillary capitulation send to the youth of America?

Quitting is for lightweights like John Edwards. Mrs. Clinton may go down, but she goes down swinging. She doesn't quit; they have to beat her (God help them).

Nancy Pelosi be damned, I still think this thing is going the distance.

From the Associated Press:

Iraqi Prime Minister Says No Retreat

"BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq's prime minister vowed Thursday to fight 'until the end' against Shiite militias in Basra despite protests by tens of thousands of followers of a radical cleric in Baghdad and deadly clashes across the capital and the oil-rich south.

"Mounting anger focused on Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who is personally overseeing operations against the militias dominated by Muqtada al-Sadr's supporters amid a violent power struggle in Basra, Iraq's southern oil hub.

"The Iraqi leader made his pledge to tribal leaders in the Basra area as military operations continued for a fourth day with stiff resistance.

"'We have made up our minds to enter this battle and we will continue until the end. No retreat,' he said in a speech broadcast on Iraqi state TV."

Defining Moment?

Is this where the Maliki government finally emerges?

Or is this the end of a brief window of relative tranquility during which we all optimistically imagined a happy ending?

Either way, my sense is that we stand on the brink of a major turning point.

An old coarse joke:

A man walks into a supermarket and ponders which toilet paper to purchase. He asks a stock person about the generic option. "Oh this is the new no-name line of products," he says. "They are much cheaper. Give it a try."

A few days later the shopper encounters the stock person in the supermarket once again: "I've come up with a name for your no-name toilet paper."

"Really?"

"Yes," the consumer says, "you can call it John Wayne toilet paper, because it's rough and tough and don't take excrement off nobody."

If I were to tell that joke today, with all due respect to the Duke, I would probably call it "Hillary Clinton" toilet paper.

Politics aside, she is one muy mal hombre.

A brief history of the repeated and exaggerated reports of the political demise of Hillary Clinton:

Dead as a doornail on the eve of NH (which she won). Clinging to life on the morning after NH and dead on the eve of Nevada (which she won). Dead after South Carolina. Presumed dead on the eve of Super Tuesday, after the Kennedy family collectively passed the torch to Barack Obama, mainstreaming the young lion for old guard Democrats and presumably neutralizing Hispanics--do you recall the spate of Bobby and César Chávez stories?

However, Mrs. Clinton spoiled her impending funeral by winning California, Arizona, and New Mexico on the strength of Latino votes, holding off a serious charge in New York and New Jersey, winning handily in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Tennessee, and, sweetest of all, winning by a wide margin in Kennedy-land: Massachusetts, where both senators and the sitting governor endorsed her opponent.

Then came the Obama winning streak, fourteen in a row (including Virginia and Wisconsin).

Especially dead after Wisconsin. The week prior to Ohio and Texas ("Hillary's Last Stand"), Jonathan Alter exhorted her to show some class, respect party unity, and quit before any more votes could be cast.

An Observation: every Jonathan Alter column must include a random FDR quote, an ostensibly fair-minded weighing of the facts, followed by a conclusion that finds that Hillary is finished and Obama is ascendant.

Mrs. Clinton elected not to follow Alter's advice.

It was March 4th and long, and she stepped back into the pocket, scrambled, somehow evaded the grasp of several 300-pound linemen, and threw a perfect strike thirty yards down the field, which she somehow pinned with one hand against her helmet for one of the greatest big plays in the history of primaries.

She won RI, Texas, and Ohio.

Still alive.

Now after losing two more primaries that do not really matter much, the funeral dirge is once again playing non-stop on every station.

Now she is Tanya Harding. "She can only win by destroying her opponent." Yeah, that's how it pretty much works in American politics.

Jonathan Alter is taking a rest, evidently, but he must have tagged David Brooks to beat on Mrs. Clinton for a few rounds.

Brooks repeats the suggestion that Clinton do the heroic thing for her nation and her party and quit:

"If she [withdraws voluntarily], she would surprise everybody with a display of self-sacrifice. Her campaign would cruise along at a lower register until North Carolina, then use that as an occasion to withdraw."

Are these guys watching the same game I am?

One more time: this nomination will be decided by superdelegates. Both sides have arguments to make for the nod. Obama has the better case on the numbers--but that does not matter. Hillary's claim is compelling enough, especially with a big victory in Pennsylvania and solid wins in Indiana and North Carolina—from which she can emerge as the candidate with momentum.

Moreover, Obama just took his first big hit over the last fortnight. Barack boosters, like David Brooks, would like us to believe that Obama "weathered the Rev. Jeremiah Wright affair without serious damage to his nomination prospects," but I am skeptical.

There is a lag time to public polling. The daily numbers will be behind any real change in public sentiment resulting from this imbroglio. The public has not really had time to digest this affair.

In truth, Obama sustained a serious shot to his image, and we have no idea how debilitating the wound will prove to be.

Hillary Clinton would be foolish not to keep throwing into the end zone. Knowing what we know about her and this campaign thus far, we would be foolish to bet against her.

Endnote: kudos to Howard Kurtz for his tongue-in-cheek treatment of this phenomenon earlier in the week.

On March 18, 2008, to mark the fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq War, activists staged a variety of protests, marches, and "direct actions" around that malodorous refuse pile known as San Francisco. Once again, the intrepid Zombie was there with his camera to capture the spirit of the psycho, moon-bat, anti-war movement.

So find a comfortable chair, pour a refreshing drink, and browse leisurely through this stunning array of images.

Just watched a significant portion of the PBS/Frontline documentary, Bush's War.

From the horror of 9/11 to the invasion of Iraq -- inside the epic story of how the war began & how it's been fought on the ground in Iraq and inside the government.

In brief: as always with any Frontline treatment of this president, there is much to say. I cannot promise that I will ever rise to any systematic attempt to offer balance, address the myriad sly omissions, or speak to the numerous invidious undertones. However, I expect that such a project could easily match the documentary itself in length and complicated story lines.

In praise of PBS, the documentary continued the Frontline tradition of artistic excellence; these works of partisan-skewed contemporary history are breathtakingly beautiful to watch.

In short, however, the tenor of Bush's War can be summed up most succinctly with this humble fact: out of four hours and thirty minutes of detailed reporting concerning the war in Iraq and the political skullduggery of the Bush White House, spanning more than six years, the documentary offered thirty seconds to Year Five and the successful "surge," with literally no mention of an Anbar Awakening or David Petraeus.

Enough said.

One of my favorite pundits, Dean Barnett, wrote today that the big problem with Barack Obama is that he is a man of inaction—all rhetoric and no ability to perform worthy deeds.

If only...

As a conservative in the most classic American sense, I would rejoice in the assurance that Obama plans to do nothing but talk.

Liberal administrations govern best that govern least.

I could rest much easier if I thought an Obama presidency portended merely lofty flights of empty rhetoric. However, an eloquent but harmlessly passive President Obama strikes me as unlikely.

If not his tendency to prefer oratory over action, what is my biggest concern with Barack Obama?

His willingness to abide deranged purveyors of scary black nationalism?

His inexperience?

His ties to shady Chicago power brokers? His slipperiness? His lack of respect for his "average white lady" grandmother?

No. Those are distractions. What is actually most troubling about Obama?

He is too liberal.

He owns the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate. According to the National Journal, he is more liberal than Ted Kennedy, John F. Kerry, Russ Feingold, Dick Durbin, and Barbara Boxer.

Under ordinary circumstances, he is way too liberal to win election as president of the United States. Generally, the “ultra-liberal” label equals certain defeat in a national election. But, unfortunately, these are not ordinary circumstances.

The Democratic candidate in 2008 will run buoyed by intense George W. Bush fatigue, restlessness over an unpopular five-year war with no end in sight, and uncertainty in the face of an economy perceived to be tenuous at best---or, even worse, on the brink of cataclysm.

The Democratic candidate in 2008 will run against a presumptive Republican nominee who is seventy-one-years-old, admittedly inexpert in economic policy, who bravely advocates extending the five-year war indefinitely, if need be.

This is a good year to run as a Democrat.

The base of the Democratic Party understands this moment. And, this time, they will not be easily intimidated into selecting a moderate candidate who will seem more appealing to centrists and independents in the fall. They just don't think they need to play things "safe" this time around. They think they are running down the court for a slam dunk. They can nominate any reasonable candidate and win. Why not pick the guy they really like--the anti-war, post-racial, Kennedyesque liberal orator?

This turn of events devastated Hillary, of course, who spent years preparing to run as a moderate, national security Democrat whom you could trust at 3:00 a.m.

As noted, the dismal unpopularity of Bush, the failing economy, and the troubles that accompany a protracted and unsatisfying military engagement make this particular political season particularly irregular.

However, even with all that, Obama still might have run into trouble, save for the "concept." Americans fell in love with this symbol for an age.

But, if Obama gets by Hillary (which I am not ready to concede), he will arrive virtually unstoppable in the General. And, if elected, I expect him to skillfully translate his electoral triumph into a mandate for liberal action. With a Democratic majority in Congress, and the Fourth Estate abuzz with adoration, we are likely to see the most active and most prolific legislating president since Lyndon Johnson.

Make no mistake, President Barack Obama could be the most transformative American political figure of our lifetimes. My worry is that the transformation is going to prove as disastrous as the last attempt at creating a so-called Great Society.

This afternoon, Robert M. Goldberg, vice president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest (whatever that is), writing for The American Spectator, charged Barack Obama surrogate, Gen. Merrill "Tony" McPeak, USAF, Ret., with pursuing an anti-Israel agenda.

McPeak recently in the news charging former-President Bill Clinton with McCarthy-like innuendo, serves as an "Obama for President" co-chair.

According to Goldberg, "McPeak has a long history of criticizing Israel" and its insistence on holding on to territory won during wars with Arab neighbors.

Goldberg quotes McPeak In a 2003 interview with the Oregonian, complaining that the Israeli lobby (Jews) intimidated American politicians from pursuing American interest in the Middle East.

I do not know Goldberg. The Spectator is an unabashedly agenda-driven opinion journal. Having said that, if this assessment bears out, taken on the heels of Senator Obama's Jeremiah Wright problem, this revelation poses another serious distraction for the Obama campaign.

Goldberg writes:

"Obama has a Jewish problem and McPeak's bigoted views are emblematic of what they are. Obama can issue all the boilerplate statements supporting Israel's right to defend itself he wants. But until he accepts responsibility for allowing people like McPeak so close to his quest for the presidency, Obama's sincerity and judgment will remain open questions."

Only time will tell, but this looks like something worth watching.

Happy Monday.

While I make no promises to get to any of these items this week, here is a brief (and undoubtedly incomplete) list of a few topics that demand closer attention:

1. In the midst of the Rev. Wright firestorm, we neglected to notice last week that Hillary Clinton enthusiastically issued a final and irrevocable pledge to abandon the mission in Iraq. Aimed at appeasing the "nutroots" of her party, Mrs. Clinton offered another more definitive olive branch to the radical anti-war Democratic base, as she girded up for the final charge of Campaign 2008.

The bad news: this means that the Democratic Party, no matter the nominee, will be irretrievably invested in defeat in Iraq. The equally dismal corollary: the mainstream media, firmly invested in the Democratic candidate, will possess a keen interest in portraying Iraq as a chaotic failure. Expect the fairly optimistic coverage (or lack of Iraq coverage) to fade--and prepare for a new burst of energy in spreading the word that all hope for success in Iraq has died.

The sober four-thousand-dead milepost is a convenient event on which to inaugurate the new storyline.

2. Rush Limbaugh and his so-called Operation Chaos is an embarrassment. The plan, which calls for "ditto-heads" to register as Democrats and vote for Hillary to throw the Democratic process into chaos, 1) makes a mockery of the democratic process; 2) makes us look like we hate Democrats more than we love America; and 3) cannot possibly achieve any of the ends desired.

In fact, the strategy will eventually be used against Hillary Clinton in the attempt to solidify the nomination for Barack Obama ("do you want to let Rush Limbaugh pick your nominee?"), and it will also give the Democrats a delicious grievance (election sabotage, "dirty tricks") around which to rally in the fall. Even worse, it just feels wrong (and dumb). Why so gleefully give our opponents the moral high ground? Bad karma. Rush should watch more Carson Daly.

3. That well-known racist and purveyor of McCarthyism, Bill Clinton, is at it again. I never thought I would feel sorry for Clinton-42--but this guy just can't buy a break from the Obama-crazed, formerly Bill-protecting, liberal media.

4. In a related matter, in our rush to nail Obama and the preacher, have conservatives missed an historic opportunity to renegotiate the toxic rules of engagement concerning public discourse and race in our political culture?

With great hope, I present this tentative agenda....